Growing up is supposed to make you independent. Strong. Self-sufficient. But no one tells you this truth clearly enough: growing up does not mean growing away.
The older I get, the deeper my love for my mother settles not loud, not demanding, but rooted like an ancient tree that has seen storms and still stands.
As a child, I loved her because she was my world. As an adult, I love her because she built my world.
Back then, her hands were magic. They fixed scraped knees, cooked comfort into food, and wiped away tears before they fully formed. I thought that was love. I didn’t know then that love also looks like silence like staying awake when you’re tired, choosing duty when you want rest, and putting someone else’s future before your present.
Now I see it.
I see the sacrifices she never announced. The strength she wore so casually. The patience stitched into her days. Tradition taught her to give without keeping score, and time taught me how rare that kind of love is.
Growing up sharpens your sight. You begin to notice the pauses in her voice, the tiredness behind her smile, the way she still worries about whether you’ve eaten, reached safely, slept enough. Age doesn’t loosen that care. It only deepens it.
And strangely, growing up doesn’t make me need her less.
It makes me need her differently.
I don’t always need her to hold my hand now but I need her presence. Her quiet faith. Her way of grounding me when the world feels too fast and too loud. In a future obsessed with speed, she remains my reminder of steadiness.
My love for her has grown more intentional. I choose it now. I protect it. I honour it. Because love that survives time, stress, distance, and change is not ordinary it is sacred.
Even as I grow, even as I change, even as life pulls me in a hundred directions, one truth remains unmoved:
My love for my mother does not end.
It matures.
It deepens.
It stays.
Like her.
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